A former guerilla or a TikTok populist? Colombia will change whoever wins

No matter who wins Sunday’s presidential election decider in Colombia, change is coming to the South American nation.

A first round of voting last month routed the traditional political elite that has run the country since 1957, as outsiders grabbed the two spots in Sunday’s run-off round. Now voters must decide between a former guerrilla attempting to become his country’s first ever left-wing president and a 77-year-old populist former mayor with no real policies to speak of apart from a promise to cleanse public life of “political thieves”.

This matchup between Gustavo Petro and Rodolfo Hernández makes Colombia just the latest Latin American nation to turn on its political class after an economically stagnant decade and growing poverty resulted in social unrest before the region became the worst hit in the world by the pandemic. Dozens of Colombians were killed last year as anti-government protests restarted, further fomenting discontent with the establishment.

Petro, a 62-year-old senator and former mayor of the capital Bogotá, won the first round with 40 per cent of the vote meaning his campaign is the closest the left has ever come to taking power in the one South American country it has never governed. But poll aggregator La Silla Vacía shows he is now in a technical tie with Hernández, the difference between them within the margin of error.

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Hernández who won 28 per cent in the first round has caught up with his rival as many voters flock to his quixotic outsider campaign as their last hope of keeping the left from power. In a country scarred by decades of civil war against Marxist insurgencies the prospect of a former guerrilla becoming president is still an anathema for many Colombians. Among some of Hernández’s most vociferous campaigners ahead of the second round are followers of former president Álvaro Uribe, the hard-right leader who broke the guerrillas’ grip over much of the country but who has faced accusations of human rights abuses and corruption.

Petro’s economic policies also terrify the business elite. He has vowed to end oil exploration, fracking and most new mining projects and reorientate the economy towards agriculture and renewable energy.

Referring to coal, oil and cocaine he said at one campaign stop: “Our three principal exports are three poisons.” But many economists warn that oil and mining provide half of Colombia’s exports. Undermining the sectors would only make it harder to fund Petro’s ambitious social agenda designed to tackle some of the highest inequality rates in the world.

In a bid to prevent him executing his plans Hernández, a self-made construction magnate and self-styled outsider, is now the new establishment candidate. This backing includes the endorsement of right-wing Medellín mayor Federico Gutiérrez, who took almost a quarter of first round votes.

Many analysts thought his voters would make Hernández the clear favourite in the run-off. But such strong establishment support is robbing him of some of his outsider status. The Petro campaign has worked tirelessly to paint Hernández as a means through which the establishment can continue to exercise power and the outsider has failed to pull clear.

In the head-to-head run-off he has also faced greater scrutiny than when he was a little-known outsider in a crowded field best known for his campaign videos on TikTok. Now his polemical tenure as mayor of the eastern city of Bucaramanga is being picked over, including accusations of corruption, though he denies any wrongdoing. These are particularly threatening as his whole campaign is based on cleaning up public life which he says will resolve many of the country’s structural problems.

Notorious for occasional foul-mouthed outbursts Hernández’s history of sexist comments is also in the spotlight. He said Colombians view women in politics as “invasive” and “the ideal would be for women to dedicate themselves to raising children”. And while the business community knows it does not like Petro’s economic plan it has little idea of what his rival would do should he win. His programme for government is vague and as his small party has a negligible presence in congress he has no clear means of implementing it, raising fears he might try to rule by decree. On Thursday, Hernández refused to comply with a court order to attend at least one debate against Petro before voting. The recriminations over the non-debate brought to an end a campaign marked by death threats against candidates and mutual accusations of dirty tricks.